


Times Change

by bardsley



Category: Dracula - Bram Stoker
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-18
Updated: 2019-12-18
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:21:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21845845
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bardsley/pseuds/bardsley
Summary: Mina tries to prepare for a future without Lucy.
Relationships: Mina Harker/Lucy Westenra
Comments: 9
Kudos: 23
Collections: Yuletide 2019





	Times Change

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rivendell01](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rivendell01/gifts).



It was quite fortunate that the Westenra’s had a typewriter for it allowed Mina to continue with her practice during her visit, and practice was certainly necessary. Why the Westenra’s owned the device, Mina could only speculate. Mina could not imagine Mrs. Westenra operating the machine and Lucy, with her ever-growing number of prospective suitors had neither the time nor need to learn. Unlike Mina. 

Mina had always considered herself to be adept. Not graceful, certainly, but her body was always able to do that which was needed of it. That was, however, before she attempted to become a typist. 

Now she felt that her body was betraying her. Her fingers refused to strike the proper keys. They were too heavy and clumsy. They did not feel as if they were under her power at all. The door opened. A sweet yet not overwhelming fragrance announced Lucy was the person who entered. The scent was inviting. Yet the visitor had not been invited. Not that Lucy required an invitation in her own home. While normally a visit from her best friend was more than welcome, Mina found herself irritated in anticipation of an interruption. 

“No, I simply can’t,” Mina said. Her treacherous finger struck an F rather than a G. 

“You can’t…? Type?” Lucy sounded sweetly puzzled rather than offended. Mina found that unnerved her for some reason as if it would be better if Lucy were angry with her. As it was, Lucy’s assumption about what she meant to say struck rather too close to the truth. 

“I cannot go on a walk with you or look at dresses or listen to you talk about--” The sharpness in Mina’s tone made her stop. She not only stopped typing. She felt for a moment that she might stop breathing. She and Lucy had been friends for years and Mina could count on one hand the number of times that either of them had spoken to each other so unkindly. 

With great reluctance, Mina turned around. She expected to see her friend flushed with anger or perhaps her pretty features drawn in with sadness. Lucy, instead, was smiling. 

Their eyes met and Lucy’s smile only brightened. Mina’s heart clanked as clumsy as her typing as if it too were striking the wrong keys. Lucy fluttered closer and took the chair nearest Mina. “Oh, good! Perhaps we can talk about it now.”

“Talk about…?” Mina allowed the sentence to remain incomplete. There was something about Lucy sitting so close that was too distracting to even allow her to form an assumption. Lucy thought so differently than Mina did that trying to make assumptions was pointless in any case. Rather than try, Mina allowed herself to experience the warmth of her friend’s proximity. 

“Whatever is bothering you,” Lucy said. “I know that something is. You have been in a state this entire visit.”

“I had not realized,” Mina said. It was partly true. She knew very well how she had felt during this visit. She had not realized that anyone else had noticed. Yet if anyone were to notice, of course, it would be Lucy. Lucy knew her better than anyone. 

Which was no doubt why Lucy was looking up at Mina now, her expression plainly disbelieving. So, Mina told the complete truth. 

“I did not realize that you’d noticed,” Mina confessed. 

“Well, you are always telling me that I am brighter than people give me credit for being. I suppose this is proof that you are right.”

Mina could not keep the offended sound she made behind her teeth. 

“Of course I notice,” Lucy said. “I love you. I notice everything about you.”

Mina’s face twisted. She turned back toward the typing machine. Mina was not trying to hide her expression, not any longer. She simply could not look at Lucy at that moment. With her back to her friend and facing her typing, Mina felt as though the tableau reflected the moment perfectly. The cheerful, warm vivacity of her friend was behind her or would be as soon as Lucy married. Life with the cold machinery of the typewriter beneath her fingertips was her future. 

The thought disturbed Mina so much that she wanted to cry out in denial. She wanted to go to Lucy, to draw Lucy into her arms, to feel the heat of Lucy’s skin under her fingertips, and let it burn away the cold future that she envisioned for herself. 

Lucy was not stupid. She was innocent, in her way, and lively. But she was smart. She knew things. She had to have already known that the time of their friendship being the focus of their lives was at an end. They were growing up. They were going on to other things. Other people. It was one of the tragedies of Lucy’s beauty--the beauty of her compassion and character as well as her body--that she drew men to love her just as she had drawn Mina. It meant things would end for them all the sooner. 

Mina did not move. She could not. Lucy knew that things were changing between them. It simply did not bother her the way that it bothered Mina. The only thing more frightening than the future that she imagined for herself was the fear that Lucy might reject her. Then Mina would shuffle on to that same cold future without even the warmth of knowing that Lucy regarded her as a friend. 

“Mi~na!” Lucy said, drawing out the name in a childish, sing-song tone that was so full of sweet familiarity that it made Mina’s teeth ache. “Are you thinking something silly again?”

“I’m not-- What? Again? I’m not silly!”

“Most of the time you’re not,” Lucy said, her tone conciliatory. “But every so often you get these notions that are--”

Mina felt the blood rising in her cheeks. It was all the more embarrassing for knowing that Lucy was right. Mina could, at times, take things too seriously. Most especially herself. Regrettably, this was not one of those times. She turned back to Lucy. “I am not--”

“--just silly.”

The two women sat staring at each other for a moment. Then they both began to laugh. The laughter loosened the cage around Mina’s heart enough that she could at least contemplate talking to her friend about what was bothering her. 

“I’m sorry that I have been--”

“--my very own rain cloud.”

Mina gave Lucy a look. Lucy threw up her hands in a gesture of surrender. “--rather distracted this visit. It is just that I cannot enjoy walking with you or chatting with you without thinking that this could be the last time that the two of us are together like this.”

“Why ever would it be the last time?” Lucy asked, astonished. 

“Well, you will marry soon--” Mina saw that Lucy was about to argue. She raised her hand to forestall the interruption. “--and things will be different then. They have to be.”

“Things will be different. But we will not. I love you. When I find a husband--If I find a husband--”

Mina gave Lucy a look. 

Lucy reverted to her original phrasing. “--when I find a husband, I hope that I will love him too. That will not make me love you any less. Our lives will be different.” Lucy reached out to twine their fingers together. “This will not be.”


End file.
